Embodied possibilities and disruptions: The emergence of the Experience of Embodiment construct from qualitative studies with girls and women

•Experience of Embodiment sheds a new lens on ways women inhabit their bodies.•Positive embodiment includes positive body connection, embodied agency, and self-care.•Study suggests continuity between positive and negative ways of inhabiting the body.•Embodiment construct allows for tracing of shifts throughout a woman's life.

There are multiple indicators of disruption in the way girls and women inhabit their bodies. The qualitative research program examined lived experiences of embodiment among girls and women by conducting 171 interviews with 69 girls and women in three different studies: (a) A life history study of 30 interviews with 11 women, ages 20–27; (b) A 5-year prospective interview study of 87 interviews with 27 girls, ages 9–14 in the first phase of the study; and (c) A life history study of 54 interviews with 31 women, ages 50–68. Data analyses used a constructivist grounded theory approach. In all three studies the emergent core construct of Experience of Embodiment had five central dimensions, each with a positive and negative pole. These dimensions included: body-self connection, agency, desire, self-attunement, and resisting objectification. The Experience of Embodiment provides a new, integrated perspective on ways girls and women inhabit their bodies.